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Ancient rhinos in Nebraska lived in large local herds and died slowly from volcanic ashfall, not sudden disaster. Credit: John Haxby/The University of Nebraska State Museum ************************************************************************* Volcanic eruption from 12 million years ago preserves a snapshot of extinct animal life. Rhinos that once roamed much of North America 12 million years ago likely lived in large herds, according to a new study by the University of Cincinnati. Researchers examined isotopes in the teeth of rhinos found in what is now northeast Nebraska. At this site, more than 100 rhinos died at a single water hole and were buried in...

* Yellowstone’s upper magma chamber is just 2.3 miles deep, closer than previously thought, raising new questions about eruption risks. * Scientists used advanced seismic imaging to map the magma system, revealing a silica-rich upper chamber and a larger basalt reservoir below. * Volatile gases venting naturally reduce pressure but don’t eliminate the long-term threat of a catastrophic eruption. * Past supereruptions reshaped landscapes and altered global climates — the last one was 640,000 years ago. * NASA’s controversial plan to cool the magma via drilling carries risks and would take millennia to show effects. ********************************************************************** Yellowstone National Park, home...

This week, an unusually strong earthquake swarm occurred at an Azores volcano which last erupted a little over 300 years ago. Meanwhile, in Japan, the alert level was raised at the Kirishima volcano, suggesting an increased risk that it may soon erupt. And, in Indonesia, it appears that a new batch of magma has intruded underneath the highly potentially dangerous Mount Awu volcano. This video will discuss these stories and list the 47 actively erupting volcanoes around the planet via the analysis of a geologist. This video's thumbnail image displays the erupting Santiaguito lava dome (Santa Maria volcano) in Guatemala....

Are two of the most dangerous volcanoes in the entire world starting to wake up? We live at a time when seismic activity is on the rise all over the planet. More than three dozen volcanoes have recently erupted, and there have been more than 850 earthquakes in California and Nevada within the past seven days. Unfortunately, most people are not taking the threat that we are facing seriously. (snip) Thankfully, seismologists do not expect Yellowstone to erupt right now. (snip) In the shadow of Mount Vesuvius, a much larger and potentially catastrophic threat looms beneath the ground—Campi Flegrei, the...

United States Geological Survey said that it started around 7:30 a.m. Tuesday, and fountains of lava are now reaching up to 600 feet. [Video] HONOLULU (Hawaii News Now) -- Fountaining at Kilauea reached dramatic heights Tuesday evening. Episode 12 of Kilauea’s current eruption began at around 7:30 a.m. Tuesday with small, sluggish lava flows from the south vent. Two hours later, similar flows erupted from the north vent and both grew significantly throughout the day. The U.S. Geological Survey said as of 3:15 p.m. fountains reached heights of 600 feet with flows covering approximately a third of Halemaumau crater. Kilauea’s...

Bronze Age footprints, both from animals and from humans, were initially identified as work was conducted on the Diramazione Nocera-Cava dei Tirreni methane pipeline in the municipalities of Nocera Superiore, Nocera Inferiore, Roccapiemonte, and Castel San Giorgio. This prompted a two-year-long archaeological investigation.SoGEarch, an Italian archaeological society, oversaw the excavations through the Superintendence of Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape for the provinces of Salerno and Avellino.The footprints found near the Casarzano stream in Salerno, roughly 20 miles away from Pompeii, contained rock fragments from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Experts believe the people who left behind these prints were trying...

A state of emergency has been declared on the Greek island of Santorini after days of consecutive earthquakes. It comes after a magnitude 5.2 tremor was recorded at 21:09 local time (19:09 GMT) on Wednesday between the Greek islands of Amorgos and Santorini, making it the strongest in recent days. It is estimated to have occurred at a depth of 5km (3.1 miles). The decree will be in effect until 3 March to "address the emergency needs and manage the consequences", officials said. More than 11,000 people have already left Santorini, with around 7,000 departing by ferry and 4,000 by...

A series of earthquakes near the Greek island of Santorini have led authorities to shut down schools, dispatch rescue teams with sniffer dogs and send instructions to residents including a request to drain their swimming pools. he strongest earthquake recorded was magnitude 4.6 at 3:55 p.m. Sunday, at a depth of 14 kilometers (9 miles), the Athens Geodynamic Institute said. A few tremors of over magnitude 4 and dozens of magnitude 3 have followed. There were no reports of damage or casualties. Earthquake experts and officials from the Ministry of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection and the fire service have...

Scientists studying six North American volcanoes situated along the continent’s Cascade Range have found active magma underneath both active and dormant volcanic sites. Previous research has suggested that volcanoes lose significant magma volume when they erupt, and any remaining magma dissipates over time. The scientists behind the discovery argue that a better understanding of the conditions underneath volcanoes could answer several enduring questions about their lifecycles, including whether or not all dormant volcanoes contain pools of magma underneath. The researchers also believe a better understanding of these magma-filled chambers could help inform efforts to prepare for potential volcanic eruptions. Even...

For the past decade, a suite of devices have been monitoring Axial’s every action — rumbling, shaking, swelling, tilting — and delivering real-time data via a seafloor cable. It’s “the most well-instrumented submarine volcano on the planet,” says Mark Zumberge, a geophysicist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif., who was not involved in the work. But in November, a particular milestone caught Chadwick’s eye: Axial’s surface had ballooned to nearly the same height as it had before its last eruption in 2015 — fortuitously, just months after monitoring began. Ballooning is a sign that magma has accumulated...

The width and color of tree rings provides an extraordinary glimpse into a tree's history. (Dmitr1ch/Shutterstock) How extreme weather leaves a lasting mark on trees and shrubs POZNAŃ, Poland — In the Arctic’s harsh borderlands, where trees wage a constant battle for survival, an international research team has discovered that extreme cold leaves lasting fingerprints in wood. These “blue rings,” visible only under a microscope, reveal centuries-old stories of climate disasters that once brought summer temperatures plunging to near-freezing. The study, published in Frontiers in Plant Science, examined pine trees and juniper shrubs in the Arctic. The research team ventured...

Archaeologists and climate scientists from the University of Copenhagen can now show that ritual sacrifices of sun stones coincided with a large volcanic eruption that made the sun disappear throughout Northern Europe. This image shows two so-called sun stones, which are small flat shale pieces with finely incised patterns and sun motifs. They are known only from the island of Bornholm in the Baltic Sea. Credit: National Museum of Denmark Volcanic eruptions shaped the destinies of ancient European societies, leading to dramatic cultural shifts and the emergence of sun worship practices among Neolithic communities. Archaeological findings, including the mysterious sun...

The first sign of an impending cataclysm in the summer of 1831 was an eerie dimming of the Sun, which for days appeared bluish green across the Northern Hemisphere. In the ensuing weeks, foul weather and a long cold snap triggered crop failures and famines in India and Japan. The instigator was long presumed to be a climate-altering plume from a major eruption, but the volcano’s identity had been one of the great unsolved mysteries of volcanology. “It’s like a whodunit,” says Clive Oppenheimer, a volcanologist at the University of Cambridge. At long last, the culprit has been unmasked in...

An undersea volcano is likely to erupt sometime in 2025 off the coast of Oregon. Such a volcanic eruption could trigger the Cascadia Subduction Mega Fault and produce a mega-thrust earthquake with a magnitude of 9.0. This much advance notice is a big deal, because forecasting eruptions more than hours ahead is “pretty unique,” says geophysicist William Chadwick. But 470 kilometers off the Oregon coast and over a kilometer beneath the waves, a volcano known as Axial Seamount ticks all the boxes that hint at imminent activity, Chadwick and his colleagues reported December 10 at a meeting of the American...

Kīlauea, one of the world's most active volcanoes, is currently erupting in Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park. Check out live video of the eruption as it sends lava spewing into the air on Hawaii's Big Island.

If you’re ever despairing about the state of the world, you can — at least, according to some scholars — be thankful it’s not the year 536 CE. To be fair, it’s medieval scholars, not 21st-century ones, who called 536 CE the worst year to be alive. But hear them out, because it sounds pretty bad. That year, a massive volcano erupted, historians believe, filling the air with volcanic ash. Of course, the majority of people affected by the disaster had no idea what was happening — they just knew it was very suddenly very dark for a very long...

Shortly after the devastating eruption, some gophers went on a very confusing day trip. A member of the gopher recovery team getting to work. Image credit: Mike Allen/UCR When Mount St Helens erupted in 1980, the resulting lava, ash, and debris turned the landscape barren for miles around. It was clear the land would take a long time to recover from the eruption. But one team of scientists had an idea about how they could help speed up the process; sending a few gophers there on a day trip. Plant life struggled to return to the area around Mount St...

I'm in one of the world's volcanic hotspots, northeast Iceland, near the Krafla volcano. A short distance away I can see the rim of the volcano's crater lake, while to the south steam vents and mud pools bubble away. Krafla has erupted around 30 times in the last 1,000 years, and most recently in the mid-1980s. Bjorn Guðmundsson leads me to a grassy hillside. He is running a team of international scientists who plan to drill into Krafla's magma. “We’re standing on the spot where we are going to drill,” he says. The Krafla Magma Testbed (KMT) intends to advance...

It’s a literal s–t storm. Stomach-churning video shows the moment human sewage erupted on a busy Chinese motorway, drenching cars, pedestrians, and bikers in what has been dubbed a “poo-cano.” The explosion of waste came around 11 a.m. Wednesday as newly installed sewage pipes in Nanning, in the southern Guangxi region of China, suddenly ruptured, according to the Sun. Shocking video shows a huge brown cloud of waste shooting up nearly 33 feet in the air and splattering cars and pedestrians across the motorway. “I’m drenched in poo, my car is splattered yellow. It’s ruined,” one driver reportedly claimed.

Avolcano has erupted in Russia after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck off the eastern coast of the country, according to state-run media. The Russian news agency, TASS, reported that the Shiveluch volcano in the region of Kamchatka started to erupt on Saturday. CNN noted that the volcano is about 280 miles from the coastal city of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, which has a population of 180,000.